Mars Photo of the Day - Dec 4 2011

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Today's Mars Photo of the Day is shows four views of Mars taken by the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) between April 27 and May 6 1999, when Mars was only 87 million kilometers from Earth. At that distance the telescope's Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 was able to see features on Mars as small as 19km wide.

Each of the images shows Mars as it completes a quarter of its daily rotation, so together the images show Mars in its entirety. Each image is centered on a different region, all of which are labeled. Details on each of the photos can be found by clicking on the image. Doing so will direct you to the official caption from NASA.

NSSDC Photo Gallery Mars

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Mars Photo of the Day - Nov 8 2011

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Today's Image of Mars is one of the most well known images of Mars. It was taken by the Hubble Telescope on August 27 2003. You can see the clearly defined south polar ice cap, as well as many other features. This is the most detailed view of Mars ever taken from Earth. 

I suggest that you click on the image because it links to the NASA page, which provides much more detail.

I would provide more detail here, but I am at NASA Langley for the #NASATweetup and don't really have time.

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Mars Photo of the Day - Sept 17 2011

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Today's Mars Photo is a comparison of two photos taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in 2001. In the June 26 2011 image a dust storm has begun in Hellas Basin (the oval at the 4 o'clock position of the image) and at the northern polar cap. The image from September 4 2001 shows the entire surface obscured by the dust storm. This comparison image shows the largest dust storm seen on Mars in decades and illustrates how quickly these legendary Martian dust storms form. There is no doubt that if we ever send a manned mission to Mars we will have to prepare for these huge storms, which seem to be a annual occurrence during the summer.

I found this image while looking at an old article on Space Today Online, so the image will link to the article, which has more details on Martian sand storms.

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